Southern California -- this just in

District attorney won't charge 911 caller in Kendrec McDade killing

October 23, 2012 | 3:53
pm

The L.A. County district attorney's office will not charge a man with involuntary manslaughter for falsely claiming he was robbed at gunpoint, setting off a chain of events that ended with an officer fatally shooting a college student in Pasadena.

Pasadena police shot and killed unarmed 19-year-old Kendrec McDade on a narrow street in the city’s northeast section March 24 as he was being chased by an officer and his path was blocked by a police car.

Prosecutors found that Oscar Carrillo lied when he told officers he was robbed at gunpoint by McDade. But the lie was just "one in a series of acts ... that culminated in the fatal shooting."

Deputy Dist Atty. Scott Goodwin said McDade's decision to run from police and eventually dash toward a police vehicle blocking his path were significant intervening factors and not a "foreseeable consequence of Carrillo's 911 call."

Moments before McDade was fatally shot, Carrillo had called 911, alleging that two men had stolen his laptop computer on Orange Grove Boulevard at gunpoint. McDade was shot as he ran toward the police vehicle, clutching the right side of his waistband, Goodwin wrote in a report.

Goodwin wrote that when shown surveillance video of the crime, Carrillo admitted the men never confronted him, that the computer was stolen from his car and that he'd never seen a gun.

Pasadena police in the aftermath of the shooting arrested Carrillo, saying his statements had led to the fatal shooting.

"Mr. Carrillo emphatically indicated a gun was involved ... that is very important. It sets the platform for the mind-set of the responding officers,” Pasadena Police Chief Phillip Sanchez told reporters.

But Goodwin found that a charge of involuntary manslaughter was not supported by the evidence. The district attorney's office has referred the case to Pasadena city prosecutors for a criminal charge of misdemeanor filing a false police report.

McDade's family has filed a wrongful-death suit against the city and police officers for wrongful
death. The Police Department has said McDade was holding his
waistband at the time of the shooting, and the officers involved say they
believed he was going for a weapon.

McDade was shot at point-blank
range by one
Pasadena police officer and handcuffed after being struck by a total of
seven
bullets, according to the Los Angeles County coroner's office autopsy
report.

The officer who was seated inside the patrol car fired four rounds through an
open window, according to the autopsy report. The second officer, who was on
foot, fired four rounds, believing his partner was involved in a firefight.

Carree Harper, an attorney for McDade family members, said
the Pasadena police chief essentially increased the level of the arrest offense
on Carrillo in response to the outcry over the shooting as he sought to justify his officers
actions. Harper said it comes as no surprise that a prosecutor eventually
declined to support that move.